Molly Ronan will not have much time to bask in the glow of her selection Friday as Lincoln High School's 2008 Rose Festival princess. Spring break has arrived, and the 18-year-old senior and some classmates are headed for the Gulf Coast to help in the continuing effort to rebuild areas shattered by Hurricane Katrina.

They leave Sunday for New Orleans and then go on to Beaumont, Texas, to work with Habitat for Humanity in building homes.

"Princess for a day," Ronan quipped.

Oh, but what a day it was for Ronan on Friday as the Lincoln gymnasium exploded in cheers as the obviously popular choice was announced to hundreds of students. This is something Ronan said she has dreamed about for longer than she can remember, and when the moment arrived it was a little overwhelming.

"I don't think I've ever been more excited or more embarrassed because I cried," she said.

Ronan's decision to spend spring break helping others was in keeping with a hectic young life filled with volunteer work. A member of the National Honors Society and a former Lincoln cheerleader, she has been a team captain for the Walk for Diabetes, a route monitor for the AIDS walk and the Breast Cancer walk and a member of STAND, a student anti-genocide coalition. In 2004, she did volunteer work for Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.

Ronan has applied to colleges in Louisiana, Mississippi and the Boston area, a long way from her Portland home. But she has family connections to both regions. Her mother, Mary Edie Meredith, grew up in Biloxi, Miss., and her father, Paul Ronan, grew up in New England, which explains her devotion to the Boston Red Sox.

She said she hasn't made a final decision but was recently accepted into an honors program at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge and will probably end up there. Ronan plans to major in English and wants to be a writer. When asked what kind of writing she wanted to do, Ronan came up with the perfect answer.

"Good writing," she said.

She can also hope that precedent counts at the 2008 Rose Festival. The crown as Lincoln's princess was given to her by Elizabeth Larson, the school's 2007 Rose Court representative who went on to become the Queen of Rosaria.